The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2): Including Public Addresses, Her Own Letters and Many From Her Contemporaries During Fifty YearsHarper, Ida Husted
History
The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2): Including Public Addresses, Her Own Letters and Many From Her Contemporaries During Fifty Years
Harper, Ida Husted
Anthony, Susan B. (Susan Brownell), 1820-1906
In thought and sympathy we were one, and in the division of labor
we exactly complemented each other. In writing we did better work
together than either could do alone. While she is slow and
analytical in composition, I am rapid and synthetic. I am the
better writer, she the better critic. She supplied the facts and
statistics, I the philosophy and rhetoric, and together we made
arguments which have stood unshaken by the storms of nearly fifty
long years.[29]
In 1878 Theodore Tilton gave this graphic description: "These two
women, sitting together in their parlors, have for the last thirty
years been diligent forgers of all manner of projectiles, from
fireworks to thunderbolts, and have hurled them with unexpected
explosion into the midst of all manner of educational, reformatory,
religious and political assemblies, sometimes to the pleasant surprise
and half welcome of the members; more often to the bewilderment and
prostration of numerous victims; and in a few signal instances, to the
gnashing of angry men's teeth. I know of no two more pertinacious
incendiaries in the whole country; nor will they themselves deny the
charge. In fact, this noise-making twain are the two sticks of a drum
for keeping up what Daniel Webster called 'the rub-a-dub of
agitation.'"
On March 19, 1860, Mrs. Stanton presented her address to a joint
session of the Legislature at Albany, occupying the speaker's desk and
facing as magnificent an audience as ever assembled in the old Capitol.
It was a grand plea for a repeal of the unjust and oppressive laws
relating to women, and it was universally said that its eloquence could
not have been surpassed by any man in the United States. A bill was
then in the hands of the judiciary committee, simply an amendment of
the Property Law of 1848, to which Andrew J. Colvin objected as not
liberal enough. Miss Anthony gave him a very radical bill just
introduced into the Massachusetts Legislature, which he examined
carefully, adding several clauses to make it still broader. It was
accepted by the committee, composed of Messrs. Hammond, Ramsey and
Colvin, reported to the Senate and passed by that body in February. It
was concurred in by the Assembly the day following Mrs. Stanton's
speech, and signed by Governor Edwin D. Morgan.[30] This new law
declared in brief:
Any property, real and personal, which any married woman now owns,
or which may come to her by descent, etc., shall be her sole and
separate property, not subject to control or interference by her
husband.
Any married woman may bargain, sell, etc., carry on any trade or
perform any services on her own account, and her earnings shall be
her sole and separate property and may be used or invested by her
in her own name.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account